St Patrick’s Day 2011 at Mt Ellen

Awesome!!!

A shot of FIS (on the right, ahead), from back in February 2008.  I had never been down FIS… until today!  Read on…..

I woke up this morning, went to Lincoln Peak to get my gear, and headed off to Mt Ellen to take part in the St Patrick’s Day celebration there.  With a forecast calling for blue skies and temps in the 40s, I had a good feeling about the day.  I started off a little uneasy, but by noontime, that would change.

I started off the day at 9:50am and stuck to the groomers for most of the morning.  Lookin’ Good was a little firm, as was Cruiser and Which Way, but Rim Run, Lower Rim Run, Upper Lookin’ Good, and Elbow were really nice and soft.  I took a quick jaunt over the Northway then u-turn onto a groomed (and first-tracks) Northridge Expressway.

Around noon, I decided to head to the base area and take a break.  It was there when I ran into some friends of mine, including Hazen and his wife Shayne, and Mark.  After a couple of beers, we headed up for a “quick” run off GMX.  The run chosen was Encore, and it was excellent – the bumps were really softening up now.  The next run, down Elbow to Cruiser, I had a collision with Shayne – we turned into each other and our boards hit resulting in a crazy fall for both of us.  Me & Mark decided to head back up and do some runs.  At the top of the Summit Quad, Mark convinced me to go down Upper FIS – my first time ever on this trail.  It was surprisingly soft, not so steep, and a lot of fun that we did it again on our next run.  Then it was over towards North Ridge to hit up Bravo, another first-time trail for me.  The headwall, which usually has exposed rock, was fully covered with tons of soft snow.  I was on such a high from doing both FIS and Bravo that we had to do Bravo again… even better the second time around!  But that was it for me – it was around 2:15 and I had an excellent day of riding in some great springtime conditions.  I returned to the deck of Mt Ellen and had a couple more beers before returning to Lincoln Peak via the shuttle bus, then home. 

After today, I can say that I have ridden every trail at Mt Ellen this season, with the exception of Black Diamond.  Today would’ve been the day to do that run as well, but I wanted to quit while I was ahead, and doing two runs each on FIS and Bravo was quite an accomplishment for me.  There’s always next time, though!